Category: shedworx

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Preparing audio podcast files using Shedworx Smart Converter

This free app from the guys at Shedworx has worked out pretty handily for me just recently as it’s got one capability that I’ve needed just recently. I needed to convert downloaded FLV files from archived UStream recordings and extract the audio out of it in order to make a podcast file.

UStream FLV file conversion is definitely a really handy feature, dealing with FLV files can be a bit problematic at times as not many apps will let you open them and do much with them. Quicktime on Mac doesn’t handle them by default so unless you install something like Perian you can’t really play them back without using a third party app like VLC.


The Smart Converter interface with the various formats for conversion.

Once the app is open you can drag and drop the video file you want to convert onto the Smart Converter window. The next step is to choose the conversion format, you can pick from presets for iPad, iPhone, AppleTV and Android devices.

In my case though to convert into an audio file I select from the ‘Other’ drop-down menu and chose the MP3 option from the list of options (but there are also presets for PSP, Playstation, XBox, Windows formats and others to choose from too).

After choosing the format you just hit the big ‘Convert’ button and wait for it to do its thing! It’s a pretty simple to use app so there’s not really any more to it, it’s worked really well for this workflow of converting FLV files. The only real limitation being that you can only convert one a file at a time but as I’m only doing one file every so often that’s not been a problem for me. If you really need batch conversion and don’t mind spending $9.99 / £6.99 then you can get Smart Converter Pro which adds batch conversion to the app though.

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Shedworx’ State of the Union 2010

I’ve written a few times about the various apps that the guys over at Shedworx make and I’m always keen to see how their product range is developing and improving.

They published a blog post recently outlining their development plans for 2010 and their main focus for 2010 is on two areas: AVCHD workflow and Digital Asset Management. As such there’s some great improvements in store for their VoltaicHD and FlamingoHD applications.

VoltaicHD: End-to-end native AVCHD workflow

In their post they talk about how they’ve always been working towards having a completely native AVHCD workflow for VoltaicHD which started with the basic AVCHD editor that was added to VoltaichHD 2.

The next step in the process is adding native AVCHD output from Voltaic including trimming / joining files. So you’ll be able to import AVCHD footage from your camera, do some simple editing and then output an AVCHD format file without having to do any format conversion. The end result should fast output of great quality files.

One cool aspect of this for me is that I’ll be able to edit some AVCHD footage and then burn it as an AVCHD disk that can play on my PS3 using Shedworx’ other app RevolverHD.

VoltaicHD is available as both Mac and Windows apps.

FlamingoHD: Improved Asset Management

FlamingoHD is Shedworx’ youngest product but one that has proven to be very useful for managing media imported from AVCHD cameras.

The areas to be improved in 2010 include re-working the media views to provide a faster, easier way to navigate your library.

Improvements in managing your library and metadata. Support for simple editing of all supported media types is also a planned feature.

FlamingoHD is available as as Mac app.

Shedworx Forums

So, I’m looking forward to seeing the improved apps as they’re released. Don’t forget too that Shedworx have support Forums on their website so if you’re looking for help and support with their products then it should be first on your list of places to go:

http://shedworx.com/forum

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Shedworx’ VoltaicHD app to add native preview / edit features

The Shedworx guys are always busy working away on improving their applications (VoltaicHD, FlamingoHD, RevolverHD) for working with AVCHD video. In a recent blog post on their site they highlighted the fact that Mac OSX 10.6 Snow Leopard doesn’t bring any changes in support for the AVCHD video format, basically OSX 10.6 still can’t natively open or edit AVCHD video so it needs to be converted in order to be edited within apps such as iMovie or Final Cut Pro.

This lack of native support has encouraged the Shedworx guys to bring some simple trimming and editing features into version 2 of VoltaicHD which will hopefully be out in October. This will be a really handy feature as it will allow some very quick editing of files without the need for conversion. It will be especially useful if you just want to grab a small section of a clip and convert that for editing in iMovie or Final Cut instead of having to convert the entire clip.

So far they’ve got basic trimming features working and have published a demo movie showing how it works, all in all it’s looking to make VoltaicHD an even handier application!

Update – VoltaicHD 2 released in October 2009

Shedworx have released version 2 of VoltaicHD adding new features such as preview of AVCHD / AVCHD Lite clips, native editing of AVCHD video and the ability to upload video to YouTube. I’ve written a post with an overview of VoltaicHD 2.

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AVCHD Lite – What is it (and why can’t I edit it in iMovie or Final Cut)? (updated)

After a few years of being available there are now many hard-disk based video cameras that use the AVCHD format for video, support for the format in video editing software is well supported now on both Mac OS X and Windows by apps like Final Cut Pro / Express, iMovie, Adobe Premiere, VoltaicHD and more. This all leads to a much simpler experience for users of AVCHD cameras than it was a couple of years ago.

AVCHD Lite – Throwing a spanner in the works?

Image of Panasonic Lumix camera that uses the AVCHD Lite format

More recent digital stills camera have started coming with the ability to shoot HD video, for many of the small compact cameras there became a need for high-quality efficient video format that could be used in small compact cameras with less capable hardware. The solution to this was a variant of the AVCHD format called AVCHD Lite.

The main differences between AVCHD Lite and the regular AVCHD: a maximum resolution of 1280 x 720p in AVCHD Lite compared to 1920 x 1080p in regular AVCHD and a less-intensive compression method – both of which make the format more suitable for less powerful camera hardware.

Why can’t I edit AVCHD Lite in iMovie or Final Cut?

AVCHD Lite throws a spanner in the works because many of the existing AVCHD editing packages are incapable of supporting it without an update to the software. At the time of writing none of Apple’s video editing applications such as iMovie, Final Cut Pro or Express support the AVCHD Lite format. Adobe’s Premiere and Premiere Elements applications also do not appear to support AVCHD Lite at this time.

The only solution for AVCHD Lite on Mac OS X at the moment is the one that saved many an early adopter like myself a couple of years or so ago when AVCHD cameras first came out – VoltaicHD by Shedworx. This is a $35 app that will convert your AVCHD Lite footage to the Apple Intermediate Codec format that can then be used in any of Apple’s video editing applications.

Some Handy Links / References…

Here’s a few links to some handy information about AVCHD Lite:

Update:

As of 04/06/09 iMovie now supports editing of AVCHD Lite files with the iMovie 8.0.3 update!

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FlamingoHD 1.0 released

I wrote a review of FlamingoHD a couple of months ago of their new media management application for Mac OS X called FlamingoHD (made by Shedworx, the makers of VoltaicHD).

At the time of the review FlamingoHD was available for sale as a beta version (for those early adopters!), however, Shedworx have reached their first milestone and have now released version 1.0 of FlamingoHD to the world!

The main new feature in the final version 1.0 release is a new filmstrip view that lets you see keyframes from the video clips in your library. This is really handy and lets you see what scenes are within your various clips:

For a more detailed overview read my previous post: FlamingoHD – Helping you manage your AVCHD media or checkout the FlamingoHD page on the Shedworx website.

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FlamingoHD – Helping you manage your AVCHD media

FlamingoHD is a new application by Shedworx (the guys that make VoltaicHD), with the purpose of helping you manage all of your AVCHD video footage. Although AVCHD has greater than ever support these days it still presents a challenge when it comes to managing all of the video that you’ve shot, especially as the convenience of shooting straight to disk or card kind of encourages you to record a lot more than you would when using tape!

FlamingoHD provides a solution to this problem by enabling direct import from your AVCHD camera or alternatively importing AVCHD clips that are already on your hard disk. It does this by providing a preview thumbnail of the video footage before you import it, this saves a lot of time compared to iMovie or Final Cut Pro as you can choose only the clips you want without having to convert the footage first.

The user interface is easy to understand as it features a left hand menu very similar to iPhoto or iTunes which contains sections for Devices, Events and Projects, very similar to the iLife applications.

Importing AVCHD footage into FlamingoHD:

The basic process is to select the source of your video footage. You can either connect your camera to your computer which will automatically show up in FlamingoHD as a device, or you can select ‘Import Media’ from the File menu to select either a single clip or a folder containing clips from a location on your hard disk, once selected they will show as a device in the ‘Devices’ section in the left hand menu. It’s also worth clarifying that FlamingoHD will actually import video, audio and images from your source device or location and can manage all of these assets within Events and Projects.

Setting Preferences and Creating Events:

With a device selected ready for import you can then choose which clips you want to import into FlamingoHD, the imported files will automatically become an Event, or more than one Event if there are multiple clips shot on more than one day. This can be controlled by a preference which allows you to switch off this feature if you just want to import everything into one event.

The application preferences are worth checking out as there are a couple of other important preferences to consider. The first is ‘Hide media already imported’ which is enabled by default, this is useful when there are a lot of clips on a camera that you have already imported as it hides the ones you’ve already brought in.

The second important preference is ‘Copy imported media to Library area’, it’s important to set this appropriately because if it is ticked any clips imported from a folder on your computer will be copied to FlamingoHD’s Library which will take up more space and will result in duplicate files. Clips imported directly from a camera will be copied to the library regardless of this setting, the location of the Library for FlamingoHD can be set in the Base Location preference under the General tab.

Creating Projects:

Once you’ve imported clips into FlamingoHD you can then group clips together into Projects, these projects can then be sent to exported in via several methods, either ready for editing or as final output.

Projects are created by selecting ‘New Project…’ from the File menu, this adds an entry under the Projects section of the left hand menu which you can name to suit. Once the Project has been created you can drag and drop clips from any of the events that you previously created.

Exporting / Converting Projects:

After creating a project you can then choose to export or convert your files. FlamingoHD has options to send files to VoltaicHD, RevolverHD, iMovie and also to the assets folder of other editing applications such as Final Cut Express or Final Cut Pro.

You can export by either right-clicking on the Project name or by selecting the Project and clicking on the ‘Media’ option from the main menu. The four options at the bottom of the menu allow you several choices for your project:

Send to VoltaicHD
This option will send your footage to VoltaicHD and it will be queued up and converted ready for use in whatever application you want.

Send to RevolverHD
Selecting this option will send your AVCHD files to RevolverHD where they can be burned as either AVCHD DVD or Blu-ray DVDs that can be played back on Blu-ray players such as the Playstation 3.

Send to iMovie…
This option is specifically for sending your project to iMovie, it creates a new project in iMovie and sends your clips to VoltaicHD for conversion, once converted you can open iMovie and all of the clips will be there in the new project.

Send to Editor…
Using this option will send files to a folder in the assets location of your preferred editing software, you can set this option in the Preferences of FlamingoHD. The AVCHD clips will be converted in VoltaicHD and copied to the folder. You can then open your editing software and bring in the files that are ready for editing.

In Beta and available now!

FlamingoHD has worked pretty well for me so far but it is worth pointing out that (at the time of writing) that it is a 0.1 version, as such it’s beta software and still being actively developed. However, the developers Shedworx have made it available to purchase now for the reduced price of $29.99 while it is in beta, the price will increase after the beta period.

FlamingoHD already provides a very useful application for managing all of your AVCHD media, but one aspect I haven’t mentioned is that it will also handle any video format that is supported by Quicktime so it can also be used for cameras that don’t use AVCHD as the video format. For me this is the key to the application’s potential, it fulfils a function that Apple’s own iLife suite doesn’t provide, that of being a specific video asset management tool.

The only criticism I can see is that it currently doesn’t provide direct playback of the video clips that are imported into it, instead the files are opened into Quicktime player. The biggest drawback of this being that Quicktime player doesn’t currently support AVCHD clips. However, Apple’s next release of Mac OS X, 10.6 ‘Snow Leopard’, is supposed to support AVCHD so that will be one solution, but in the meantime perhaps enabling AVCHD clips to open in the open source VLC player could be integrated as this already provides playback of AVCHD footage. The next release version 0.2 will provide a film-strip view of clips which will at least make it easier to examine the clips in more detail without needing to open them.

Give it a try for yourself, there’s a demo version that is limited to a maximum of 2 events, 2 projects and 50 clips, this gives you enough to try it out and kick the tyres. There are also demo versions of VoltaicHD and RevolverHD so you can test out the whole workflow. Finally, don’t forget to give feedback to the developers via the FlamingoHD contact form, they’re keen to consider people’s ideas and to hear about any issues people encounter with the software.

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State of the Union for AVCHD: Premiere CS4, MotionBox, VoltaicHD and AVCHD Lite

I thought it would be good to take a quick look at how support for AVCHD video has progressed over the last year. When I first wrote about AVCHD back in June 2007 there was very little support, cameras had been out for quite a few months but with no real support for the AVCHD format, not even within Sony’s own Windows-only Vegas editing software, never mind any kind of Mac support.

Since then however support has improved and there are quite a few options for working with AVCHD and cameras are in widespread use. Here are a few notable developments surrounding AVCHD video format.

Adobe Premiere CS4

With the release of Adobe’s new CS4 suites brought back a Mac OSX version of Adobe Premiere CS4. What is interesting about Premiere CS4’s AVCHD support is that it is native and doesn’t require any conversion of the video footage when importing. Interestingly it will also support playback of mixed media types all in the same timeline.

Premiere was the first digital editing software I ever used and in it’s day was awesome. This new release does sound like Adobe have made some great improvements and have made a worthy rival to Final Cut and Avid.

Here’s a few links relating to Premiere CS4:

MotionBox Announces Full Support for HD Video Format (AVCHD)

MotionBox is a video sharing site that was the first to implement support for uploading AVCHD format video. It’s actually quite a handy way to share video online and in the process convert your AVCHD video clips as MotionBox will also create Quicktime compatible MP4 versions of your video for your computer and your iPod.

Here’s a link to the feature announcement on the MotionBox blog:

Shedworx’ AVCHD applications – VoltaicHD, RevolverHD and FlamingoHD

I’ve blogged about the Shedworx applications a few times, but where would many owners of AVCHD cameras be (especially the early adopters who bought them in late 2007!) without VoltaicHD?

Although VoltaicHD was originally just a Mac OSX application it has also been available as a Windows PC version for some time too. Among the many benefits that VoltaicHD brings is a low cost way to edit video on Mac, especially for users on older Macs running PowerPC chips that aren’t supported by either iMovie 08 / 09 or Final Cut Studio. Windows PC users can also edit HD footage from their AVCHD camera for a low cost by using VoltaicHD and Windows Movie Maker. VoltaicHD has helped make AVCHD a practical format for video editing.

Shedworx are soon to release the first version of a media management application called FlamingoHD which is intended to complement VoltaicHD and provide management and workflow of HD footage.

Here are links to the VoltaicHD and FlamingoHD product pages:

AVCHD Lite

AVCHD Lite is a new variation of AVCHD which supports only the lower 1280x720p HD format. It actually uses a variation on regular AVCHD so many applications may require a software update to support cameras using the Lite variation. AVCHD Lite is generally targeted as a format for small point-and-shoot digital cameras that take a step up to HD video from the regular 640×480 standard definition video found on many of these cameras until now. Panasonic’s Lumix ZS3 and TZ7 are examples of cameras using AVCHD Lite.

Here’s a few links relating to AVCHD Lite: